Billy

This is a test image for a huge series of work based upon my friend Billy from Chicago. He's been quite the muse for me the past few months, and I know that drawing and painting him will be good therapy for my hurt soul.

"Showing Off," Oil on Canvas Board, 2009

July

I've never cared for this month. Summer is not my season, but I'm learning to like it more and more.

With my mother's illness and death, I can officially declare that a long chapter of my life is over.

A new chapter is starting and I await the Universe's first words.

It's a Fine Day

It’s a fine day.
People open windows.
They leave their houses.
Just for a short walk.
They walk by the garden.
They look at the sky.
It’s going to be a fine night tonight.
It’s going to be a fine day tomorrow...

--Miss Jane 1992 UK

Quite a Life.

Margaret Joyce Cook left this Earth at 12:05 p.m. on Tuesday June 16, 2009. I was holding her left hand and taking her pulse with my right. She lived exactly nine weeks after being diagnosed.

I'm still getting used to the idea of her having cancer. What happened last week hasn't sunk in yet. I don't believe it.

But I know one thing: life has forever changed.

The End of the Beginning.

Mom is broken beyond repair. The cancer is spreading like fire through her body. There is nothing more science can do; in her case, and like so many others, the cure is worse than the cancer. The chemo needed to stop this cancer would kill her much faster than the cancer.

I will soon enter a new age. An age marked by the single most important person in my life leaving her physical form and joining the universe. I'm frightened, and yet excited.

This is real point where you're pushed out of the nest. Like my mother's energy, I must learn to fly away from the present. I must join the future.

Mother

Joyce is fighting a hard battle. Each day brings new challenges. It saddens me to know that her type of cancer is so poorly researched because it isn't attached to her breasts. How sick and sexist of our society to be physically subjective when it comes to matters of life and death.
I dream of a new world where every cancer is fought with equal vigor, and where certain cancers are not celebrated with fund-wasting parades that seemingly mock those fighting outside of the spotlight.

10% of women may get some form of breast cancer, but HALF of all women will battle some form of cardiovascular disease. Where's the parade for that?